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It is quite dark. Clearly it calls for a spell, and after mulling over it for a second you decide to use Dark-Sight. The tunnel in front of you brightens, as if illuminated with pale, silvery light. The gloom does not go away by much; a murky dimness still clouds your sight, but it is something you can work with.

As you proceed further, the roughly hewn steps give way to stone. The squelching under your boots turns to a loud clanking noise as the last of the mud is trod away underfoot. There is no denying it – the armour is not made with stealth in mind. You are forced to turn sideways to enter the narrow passageway at the bottom of the steps, the grandiose spikes on your armour jutting out at too sharp an angle to allow you to pass normally. Shuffling awkwardly, you move like a crab until the corridor opens out into a chamber.

There, silhouetted in silver, is a body. The fallen torch by its side still burns brightly, enough that with your Dark-Sight you can make out its condition. It is that of a man, slumped against the wall. His armour and cloak are that of a knight of Methuss. What is one of those doing in a place like this? From the looks of it he was felled by the large arrow protruding from his chest. As you cast your gaze around, you spot the likely culprit: a very basic, fundamental trap. A loose flagstone, a weighted trigger, and there you have it, one silly dead knight who didn’t look before he stepped.

Instinctively, you move towards the body to see if there is anything to loot. As you do so, your left foot lands on a strangely loose stone that sinks slightly when your weight presses down on it. There is a loud thwick in the air as yet another trap lets loose its deadly payload.

The arrow flies towards you, its trajectory swift and true, and promptly splinters against your Forceshield.

Having adventured with a rogue that neglected to disarm most traps, you have learnt to put your trust in your magic instead of your fellow companions. It’s a lesson that has served you well, for the most part.

As you kneel besides the corpse, it jerks and gasps. “W-who’s there? Mollen? Arnaut? Why did you come back here?” wheezes the knight, who is apparently not quite dead yet. You lower the fist that you had been planning to smash his head in with, just in case he turned out to be an undead of some sort.

“Guess,” you say, your voice made resonant by the helm you wear.

“You’re… no, you’re not,” he sighs, unable to even lift his head to glance at you. The knight takes a painful pause before continuing, “I do not know who you are, stranger, but this ruin is dangerous. Leave while you can.”

“If it is so dangerous, why are you here?” you ask, trying to dig for information as quickly as you can.

The knight does not answer, his breathing growing more and more shallow as he slips back into unconsciousness. You take the opportunity to search his belongings.

There is nothing of note, nothing that can be of use to you, not even a convenient scrap of paper that should have his orders written as plain as day, perhaps even signed off by a princess. Well, if any princesses survived that little fiasco at Yuiria, that is. You sigh at this lack of convenience and stand back up, looking around the chamber again.

Though it is too dim to make out any clear details, the walls are covered with carvings in a script unfamiliar to you. They might be telling you the purpose of this place, or perhaps it is a long and convoluted ancient joke, but you would not be able to tell, not without being literate in the language. There are no torches of any sort besides the one that the knight brought with him. Three other passages lead out of the square chamber, besides the one you entered from.

The passage ahead of you is wide, allowing you to travel normally. The air wafting from it is very cold, almost freezing in its iciness. That is certainly strange, and possibly a mark of a magical trap of some sort.

The passage to your left is narrow, and you would certainly have to turn sideways to navigate it again. The air from this passage is wet… musty, and pungent, like the breath of a beast. From the muddy footsteps you can tell that three other people have went this way; quite likely the comrades of the fallen knight.

And on your right lies the strangest passage of all: it is shaped exactly like the silhouette of a man, with limbs and head and torso carved into the rock. It would be impossible to enter this passage with your armor on – you would have to remove it and squeeze your way through. Its weird aesthetic aside, there is nothing else strange that you detect from this particular exit.

***

You decide to take the:

A. Front passage. It is wider, affording you more space to maneuver even in your bulky armour. Though a magical trap might lie ahead, you are confident in your abilities to handle it.

B. Left passage. The knight’s comrades have elected to go that way – perhaps they know something you don’t. You may be able to catch up with them and find out more about this place too.

C. Right passage. It is just absolutely interesting how this passage seems to be made for you. You remove your armour and see where this road takes you.

***

Before you leave, you wonder if you should try and heal the fallen knight. Although you are no medical expert, you can at least remove the arrow and use Minor Healing to aid him. Whether or not he survives afterwards is up to his own constitution.

A. You heal the knight. Though he would not be in a condition to speak immediately, putting him in your debt may be useful in the future.

B. You ignore the knight. Mana is not charity. You would rather hoard it for your own use. Besides, there is no telling if he will become an enemy in the future.

Instinctively, you move towards the body to see if there is anything to loot. As you do so, your left foot lands on a strangely loose stone that sinks slightly when your weight presses down on it. There is a loud thwick in the air as yet another trap lets loose its deadly payload.

The arrow flies towards you, its trajectory swift and true, and promptly splinters against your Forceshield.

Click to expand...

I love that Erd's immediate reaction after seeing a knight half-dead from a trap and thinking about how stupid he was is to walk into the same trap to grab at loot.
CA > BA again for this vote.

Any chance to strip down is obligatory, and the lack of chilly drafts and mustiness indicate it as the comfiest place in here to get to exploring. If we are to go for something else, the sort of damp and musty option seems like it would probably be the preference of slimes compared to the chillier area.

I'm pretty ambivalent about healing him, but I figure if the guy is both dumb and weak enough to succumb to an arrow trap like an extra despite having had armor and friends he can't be all that threatening as an enemy. The mana cost is essentially trivial despite our reduced state, and it doesn't seem as if he'd be in a state to fight for quite a while.

And on your right lies the strangest passage of all: it is shaped exactly like the silhouette of a man, with limbs and head and torso carved into the rock. It would be impossible to enter this passage with your armor on – you would have to remove it and squeeze your way through. Its weird aesthetic aside, there is nothing else strange that you detect from this particular exit.

Good grief, treave must really want to punish us for killing that city...and for unleashing the end of the world...and for screwing up just about everything else.

"We’re going to try and make you into a… kkk kkzzh masterpiece." ~ The Voices, Epic
"Man Tiger Pig is mysterious in his ways. He comes and goes like the wind, sometimes as a man, at other times a pig, even occasionally a tiger." ~ Jing, Legend"How they scurry, these humans. They that are archons of the sublunar realm die as any other." ~ The Druj, Dirge
“The touch of the dead eats away at both body and mind.” ~ Unknown Number, Spiral
“No, that wing… that shining halo… it is not a demon,” gasps a mage. “It’s a… it’s a Carnage Pigeon!” ~ High Mage, Overlord
"YOU ARE DEATH. REDEMPTION IS NOT FOR YOU TO FIND." ~ The Occupant Of The Golden Throne, Emperor of Nothing [40k CYOA]

Dodged a bullet there. I cannot imagine the embarrassment of dragging out deformed body over to Zayan for her to heal us (if the regen pod can heal such deformities).

Spoiler(Move your mouse to the spoiler area to reveal the content)Show SpoilerHide Spoiler

"We’re going to try and make you into a… kkk kkzzh masterpiece." ~ The Voices, Epic
"Man Tiger Pig is mysterious in his ways. He comes and goes like the wind, sometimes as a man, at other times a pig, even occasionally a tiger." ~ Jing, Legend"How they scurry, these humans. They that are archons of the sublunar realm die as any other." ~ The Druj, Dirge
“The touch of the dead eats away at both body and mind.” ~ Unknown Number, Spiral
“No, that wing… that shining halo… it is not a demon,” gasps a mage. “It’s a… it’s a Carnage Pigeon!” ~ High Mage, Overlord
"YOU ARE DEATH. REDEMPTION IS NOT FOR YOU TO FIND." ~ The Occupant Of The Golden Throne, Emperor of Nothing [40k CYOA]

It is a tight squeeze, but you manage, even in armour. You inch your way through the narrow and twisting corridor, careful to keep your guard up. The air grows thicker and hotter and heavier as you progress, until you can barely breathe. The temptation to remove your helmet is high. There is no space for you to do so, however, and you abandon the notion. However, there seems to be nigh to no end to this interminable tunnel, which has now begin to slope and spiral downwards.

Indeed, patience is a virtue, but suffering in a hot, sweaty dungeon crawl is not a situation which would lend itself well to virtuousness in the first place. You consider your options. You could continue to make your way down the tunnel at a slow, uncomfortable pace. Or you could just make things quick.

You decide on the latter. Your feet come to a halt. You gather your concentration, ignoring the sweat trickling down your brow ticklishly. Then, you mutter the incantation, and transform yourself into lightning.

In the blink of an eye later you are at the exit, leaving behind a slightly scorched trail in your wake. It looks like the corridor has opened out into a large, circular chamber, as big as the main hall of any castle you have cared to visit. At its center is a massive pillar of metal, within which a caged purple flame burns furiously, shining as brightly as a star. Unidentifiable lines of machinery extend from the pillar in a spidery web that embeds itself into an organic, flesh-coloured matter covering the walls and the floors. The entire room pulses and throbs rhythmically, as if you were in the heart of some gigantic beast.

As you land, the chamber trembles and twists. You steady your footing, looking up at the pillar. There are inscriptions running up and down its bulk, words that you cannot read.

“This is…” Barbatos speaks up for the first time in a while. “Ah, so this was where it was buried, was it?”

“Well, if you have an interesting story to tell, spit it out,” you say. “I don’t want to be walking blindly into a place where there’s no

“Oh, this was before even my time,” says Barbatos. “It dates back to the old gods, the ones that the Demon God Vaalgrahf defeated to usher in the age of peace. I was born after that, but I have heard the stories. Gigantic beasts built as weapons to suppress Vaalgrahf’s glorious rebellion… the Beasts of Heaven. Let me see… these inscriptions say…”

He hums and haws, muttering strange words under his breath that remind you of some of Zayan’s ramblings. “Right, we are in reactor number four here, and this belongs to the Bull of Heaven, Gugal. And there are a lot of warnings about how you should not touch the pillar without knowing what you are doing, or else it might explode and kill everything you care for.”

You gaze up and down the pillar and decide to keep clear from it, if that is the case. “Is there anything useful at all about this Bull of Heaven? Can it be controlled?” you ask.

“I wonder. Certainly the stories indicate that it was obedient to them during its rampage, and so control must have been imposed somehow. But as to how… I would not be sure. There may be some other location in the beast’s body that will tell us how.”

“Well, if only we had a map,” you sigh.

Suddenly, a loud blaring noise fills the air. It is ear-splitting and irritating, causing Barbatos to remark that “Oh, that is probably the alarm.”

“I didn’t do anything!” you shout, your go-to response whenever that line is uttered.

“No, it probably wasn’t you, but…”

From the distant end of the chamber, a set of large doors bang open and three knights come running in. Two of them make to close the door behind them and bar it with their bodies, but it is thrown open by a pair of gigantic hands, sending the knights flying. The owner of those hands comes striding into the hall, a giant, muscular humanoid with the head of a bull, its horns aflame with red fire.

It’s a Minotaur Firelord, of the very same type you dispatched on your very first day in this world. What an interesting sight.

Then, four more of its brethren file in through the door as the knights scatter, fleeing for their lives. What is this, a minotaur breeding ground?

“They seem to be the guards for this facility,” answers Barbatos.

“Bull-headed guards guarding the Bull of Heaven. These old gods certainly liked their thematic designs.”

“Right, shall we be off punching them, then?” Barbatos seems hopeful.

***

A. You go to the knights’ aid, distracting the minotaurs and engaging them in battle. You would have to be careful to avoid damaging the central pillar in any way, so you would have to refrain from using your more powerful spells, but you can probably manage somehow. Probably.

B. You decide to stay back and watch. If you hide for long enough, the bulls might settle down after they have dealt with the intruders. Then you can be on your way unpestered so long as you don’t make the same mistake they did of triggering the alarm.

C. You zip back up the way you came and take another route. Why bother going through a path where there is certain to be trouble?